Page 62 of The Sorcerer's Thief
I adjust my grip.
“Have you regressed so far since our last dance? Shall I spin you around the ballroom once more? I’ll always be a step ahead of you, pet.”
Behind me, someone drags the injured, moaning guard out of the room. The metallic tang of his blood stings my nose and makes me shiver.
The dagger feels hot in my hand. Burning.
This was a bad idea.
Tauren stalks closer. “Where are all your pretty words, hmm? You used to beg so nicely for me.”
“I won’t be begging tonight.” My voice is weaker than intended.
“Oh, I think you will.”
I aim the dagger but don’t get a chance to use it. Unfamiliar magic scalds my hand and forces my fingers to stay clenched painfully tight around the handle.
I wrench my neck to see whose magic has temporarily bested mine.
It’s the red and gold fae from the watch post. I rack my brain for any hint of recognition, but no, I don’t know him. He arches perfectly manicured brows, his expression amused.
Tauren slinks forward. I intend to lunge for him, but I can’t move.
Panic clamors inside the jail of my ribcage.
“Julie”—Tauren’s hand lands on my hair and smooths it back behind my ears—“meet Rune of the Vesper lineage, my new flame. Rune, meet the old flame, Julian ofquestionablelineage, as it were.”
Rune clucks his tongue, and his fire blazes around my hand, searing the flesh. The Gatekeeper’s dagger clatters to the ground. I struggle to free myself from an invisible hold, my hand throbbing, my mind racing, but nothing works.
A line of guards waits behind the red mage.
I’m outnumbered and outmatched.
“What do we have here?” Rune plucks the dagger from the ground with dainty fingers. “Ice magic? So the rumors about you are true.”
“True enough,” says Tauren.
I want to spit. To howl. To tear him apart limb for limb, but I can’t even cry out for help.
Not that anyone would help me.
Rune inspects the dagger. “I’ll be keeping this. Now”—he presses the tip of the blade to my jaw and drags it to my bottom lip—“what shall we do with you?”
I thought I knew fear. I thought we were well acquainted. But the way this pair of demons are looking at me unlocks a level of terror I hadn’t known existed.
“Have him brought to the The Stag, would you, dear?” Rune paces a slow circle around me, trailing one fingertip around my throat. “I should like to question him before we make any rash decisions.”
Tauren calls for more men.
Rune’s magic releases me. For a brief second, I’m convinced I’ll be able to fight back, but the floor rises to slam my face, and blackness takes hold.
Chapter 21
Cricket
Ipat Slinger on the rump and turn her loose to graze. “Don’t go far, girl. We’re camping here tonight.”
She snuffle-snorts as if she understood and wanders off to a thicket of vegetation. Dusk settles in around me, the light slowly fading as the rising crescendo of bugs sings out to the night sky.
